Dark Stone is Diablo all over again, and that is a good thing. As not only is it the great Diablo again it is improved on diablo. It has better sound, far better visuals, better gameplay and more options that add to the replay value.

Games are all about atmosphere and game play. And Dark Stone sure sets the mood and atmosphere. You can play as 1 or 2 of 8 characters. Namely Warrior, Amazon, Thief, Assassin, Wizard, Sorcerer, Monk and Priestess. In one player mode it plays like Diablo, if you choose to take 2 characters however it plays like diablo but you control 2 characters. 

The town, the dungeons are all well laid out. The dungeons are spread around in sets of 4, you complete 4 then go back up to town, and find out about your next goal. The missions you play through vary, each time you play through the missions are different, your goals are similiar but never the same and the order of the missions is always very different. 

You can always start again, you can even use your character from the last game even with all his money, items and level improvements. In fact this is how you get to play on the harder difficulty levels. Once you have a soldier of level 20 you can go to Intermediate Difficulty, and once you reach level 35 you can go onto expert hardness.

The visuals are stunning, in 3rd person isometric perspective, but youre not stuck in one view, you can rotate or zoom the camera or view from a top down view. The graphics are spectacular and the fireworks come out when you use magic as the spells look great.

The music is of average quality, but the sound effects sound great and but you there in amongst the action.

You can play through the game multiple times as each time its unique, you face things in a different order, some missions not even there sometimes. And with 32 missions every time, you've got some stuff to work through. Then why not have a go at the game over LAN or the net, up to 4 players can battle their way through the game.

Developer : Delphine Soft

Overall : 95 / 100

Game Play : 97 / 100 
Graphics : 95 / 100
Longitivity : 96 / 100
Multiplayer : 94 / 100
Sound : 94 / 100

System Requirements

Minimum
PII 233, 32MB RAM, 8X CD-ROM, 4mb 3D Accelerator, 170MB Hard Drive Space, Sound Card, Win95/98

Recommended Minimum
PII 300, 64MB RAM, 34x CD-ROM, TNT/Voodoo 2, Sound Card, Win95/98